Dyed in the Wool

I just finished and posted the first strip in a new collaborative webcomic project. Check it out here.

Blooming got 2nd place in the knitting category in Threadknits! Totally awesome! :D :D

I'm off to Minneapolis this week for a conference, the Frankensocks in tow.

“Blooming” Bloomed and Rock Opera

So the winners for the 2009-2010 Threadknits competition will be finalized and announced tomorrow.  You can see my entry here.  All in all, I think that the deer came out alright.

 

And a video too!

So in the aftermath of the deer, I’ve been working on a couple of things.  A friend of mine and I are working on a craft-centric webcomic, and I have socks and a sweater/jacket for my mother on the needles.  Last night, I didn’t work much on any of them.

I watched a rock opera instead.

Specifically, Repo!: The Genetic Opera.

It was something the Colonel brought home after watching some of the songs online, so after dinner we settled in for it.  I have to say, I found the concept very interesting, some scenes rather amusing, but some of the lyrics a bit forced.  Also, I’m not head-over-heels in love with modern gothic culture, so visually, I was sort of eh. Like when Sarah Brightman’s eyelashes looked like they could have fluttered away with her cyborg-eyes and not have been over-laden.  They could have carried coconuts, I swear.

At the same time, I’m so very interested in Repo Men.  If the date comparisons are correct, then both Repo Men and Repo! were created concurrently.  Still, from a folklorist standpoint, it’s pretty cool to see stories about companies financing and then violently repossessing biological tissue cropping up independently of one another.  And there’s a novel too! Triple trouble!

Guess what my next library checkout is going to be?

I’ll leave you with my favorite scene from Repo! and the trailer for Repo Men.

Blossoms for "Blooming"

All of the blossoms and individual petals for "Blooming" have been knitted, and I've got all the buttons where they need to be on the antler/branches.

What's left?

Details, man. Details.

I'm needle-felting the centers onto all the blossoms. I have enough to fill (and I mean fill) a quart-sized baggie. I'll count them later.

The deadline fast approaches, but I'm feeling great!

In other news, I have a new phone (with which I took the above picture)! I'm now lovingly toting about a Palm Pre Plus. I haven't found anything wrong with it yet, but I'm also still getting the basic navigation down. It's fun, though! My next challenge with it is getting ePub format books onto it.

But first - THE DEER.

The Face of "Blooming"

Because, you know, it has one now.

It also has new bones. The PVC structure wasn't working, so the Husband (aka the Colonel) ordered surgery. The original armature was replaced with an engineered substitute made of a compilation of wood and galvanized screws. That's right, folks. We made him better. We have the technology.

All that's left to do are the blossoms for the antler/branches (plus the buttons that will hold them on) and the rest of the white-spot blossoms to be needle-felted onto the body.

CHUGGA CHUGGA. I feel productive. :D

Shifting and Struggling

Since August of 2009, I have had two e-mail addresses with Google.

One used my maiden, and the other my married name.

It was easy to tell Google to forward all of the messages sent to the former address to the latter, so I would only have to check one account. The Blogger utility became another barrier to this merger of Intenet Identities, however. Finally, I just invited my Married Self to be an author of this blog, had my Maiden Self give Married Self administrative priveledges, then promptly booted Maiden Self from the author list. (My Married Self is ruthless, I tell you!)

Anyway, so that's why there is an s on the end of my username now. All Married Self is is a doppleganger of Maiden Self. Or a pluralized version, which is actually sort of appropriate given the difference (and the fact that the username is a collective noun).

This post has more than a few things to do with marriage, actually. As you have likely concluded, I am that. Married. I have a husband who I fondly refer to on Twitter as "Husband" or "Colonel Sweatpants."

Said partner in marital bliss has been helping me with the "Blooming" project for Threadknits by offering moral support, spatial reasoning skills, and an extra pair of hands to hold the sucker steady. Last night over dinner, the Colonel regailed me with a tale he heard as a child about a deer hunter in Appalachaia.

When he had an animal in his sights, he realized he had forgotten to bring any ammunition, so he used a cherry pit - a waste product of his lunch - to shoot a buck between the eyes. The buck lived, and the next time the man went hunting, he saw the same buck. It now had a cherry tree growing out of it's head. Remind you of anything?

The deer is progressing well. He's felted, and the Colonel and I are trying to figure out the best approach to get the antler/branches on. The pink Lamb's Pride for the blossoms hasn't arrived yet, but I do have the roving to needle felt the black and white details on the deer's body. It's coming along rather well, I think, given the deadline.

Blooming Deer!

I can't work on him. I ran out of yarn. It's sad. Hopefully, more Lamb's Pride will arrive from Nebraska ASAP.  I'm ITCHING to work on him! I can't waste this enthusiasm!

I have the three other hooves ready and waiting to have live stitches picked back up and for legs to be knitted.  I wish I could start on the antlers, but I'm afraid to before I felt him, since the antlers won't be felted.  I have a rough idea of how I am going to make the cherry blossoms, but again, waiting for yarn.

Waiting waiting waiting.

But it's not like I don't have plenty of other things to work on in the meantime.

"Blooming" - Phase 1.5

So the main focus of my creative energies at the moment is my entry for Threadknits.  My entry is based on T.J. Zhang's lovely "Blooming."  The plan is to knit this life-sized stag sans antlers, felt him, then add the rack when I stick the armature in him.  The cherry blossoms (also felted) will then be buttoned on.

I'm hoping for him to be a versitile display sculpture for C R Yarn.   You know, that wonderful LYS that I practically live at? That's the one.  (Plus Rita and Candice, the owners, are amazing women who have my utmost respect and adoration.)

Anyway, have some pictures.  In the ones where he's stuffed, he's full of plastic bags.